South Africa : The best Test team by a country mile in last 10 years?

[Joseph Gomes]

Nowadays a lot of people don't care about wins at home. Winning a single away match is considered more impressive than whitewashing other teams at home

South Africa leads the away match stats by a HUGE margin. A daylight of difference between South Africa and the rest

South Africa away W/L ratio is 2.50. The next best is Australia's 0.83. England is 3rd at 0.75



As you can expect, India is by far the biggest hometrack bully, with a W/L of 7:1. Australia is a distant second with 3.6



South Africa is really blessed with good cricketers.

 

[Haz95]

South Africa has been a top 3 team for as long as I can remember and will most likely remain that way due to a pretty good system. Even when they weren't in cricket am sure they had players like Barry Richards and Pollock who were missing out, showing that there talent will always be there. So long as the interest remains in cricket, they will remain a top team.

Regardless of the Aus whitewashes, I'd say Aus are arguably the #1 team ATM tho.

 

[Napa]

The reason that we have SA at 109 pts and India at 122 is that while SA may have won more abroad, it has lost even more at home.

A team that can't even defend at home is not worthy of consideration.

 

[Bilal7]

South Africa fielding one of the greatest teams of all time a few years back and that, coupled with that outstanding away record makes them the test team of this decade. Pakistan is arguably second with an invincible home record and decent performances overseas.

1) Graeme Smith (c)
2) Alviro Petersen
3) Hashim Amla
4) Jacques Kallis
5) AB de Villiers
6) Faf du Plessis
7) Mark Boucher/De Kock (wk)
8) Vernon Philander
9) Dale Steyn
10) Morne Morkel
11) Robin Petersen

This was an outstanding team. They had the best bowler (Steyn), best batsman (Amla), best all-rounder (Kallis) and best captain (Smith) in the world at the same time.

 

[ethan hunt]

Southafrica's overseas record is tainted courtesy the regular ball tampering episodes off late where they have been penalised and proven guilty .
Their two most notable test wins vs srilanka and pakistan recently were marred by incidents where there players were caught red handed .

They are an impressive side though and have produced some great players .

 

[Test fan]

india atleast win most of the match on home turf but some medicore team can't even win own home (lose to westindies ) & even worst is that lose to biggest minnow team like zimbabwe

 

[Bilal7]

india atleast win most of the match on home turf but some medicore team can't even win own home (lose to westindies ) & even worst is that lose to biggest minnow team like zimbabwe

India got destroyed by O'Keefe and lost a series to England at home...

 

[The_Odd_One]

Not just tests, SA has been the best ODIs team as well in the last 10 years.

At one point, probably in 2011/2012, SA had an ATG team which would beat most of the ATG teams on any day.

SA has won a series vs Australia in their own backyard without Steyn and AB, something which India could not do with their ATG team against a third string Australian bowling attack.

 

[Napa]

SA has won a series vs Australia in their own backyard without Steyn and AB, something which India could not do with their ATG team against a third string Australian bowling attack.

Obviously the style of SA bowlers is more suited for delivering victories in Aus compared to Asia. This constant harping on performance in Australia suggests a residual colonial hangup.